15

C.—2

topographical sheets, and 167 block sheets ;in all, 252 plans. The eighty-chain survey district maps for lithographing will be pushed on as quickly as circumstances will admit. The return of work done for other departments shows that the cost of plans, tracings, descriptions, &c, for the Property-tax, Public Works, and Native Departments, and for local bodies, equals the salary of a junior draughtsman. General Remarks. —The roads and triangulation completed by Mr. Hallett, who was absent from duty for two months on sick leave, have been executed expeditiously, and at a very small cost. Mr. Bich's surveys are very satisfactory, his maps being well drawn and his field-books and calculations exceedingly neatly kept. Mr. Irvine's surveys for the past year have not yet been inspected. Pboposed Opeeations and Woek on Hand, 1883-84.—The minor triangulation on hand for survey is 361,000 acres. Mr. Hallett, in connection with road surveys, will extend over 128,000, perhaps 200,000, acres, in the settled Districts of Waipukurau, Pourerere, and Porongahau. Standard bench marks will be laid down in the Townships of Kaikora, Waipawa, Waipukurau, and Porongahau. There are 145,000 acres to be done in the Waikare-Mohaka Confiscated Block; here, again, the triangulation will be carried out in conjunction with the surveys of blocks and roads. Mr. Price is closing the minor triangulation in the Hawke's Bay and Poverty Bay Circuits on the boundary line. Some small triangulations will be carried forward with the road surveys in several districts. Section Surveys. —The area at present down for settlement surveys is 22,034 acres; for education reserves, 1,000 acres ; for arrears of surveys, representing applications surrounded by old surveys, which must be marked off before titles can be issued, 4,666 acres; for new applications, school sites, &c, 279 acres : total, 27,209 acres. Roads. —The mileage on hand through Crown-granted blocks and lands held under Native Land Court titles is 134. The most pressing demands being met, there is no occasion to anticipate the department not being able to overtake the roads required in all those blocks over which the rights have not yet expired. Native Land Court Surveys. —An extensive area of 324,404 acres is down for survey; of this, 237,000 acres are subdivisions of the Waikare-Mohaka Confiscated Block. The back boundaries of the blocks abutting on the 39th parallel of latitude have never been defined; these will have to be surveyed : in other blocks use will be made of the old and adjoining surveys, which, in several cases, will only require to be connected with the triangulation. Sketch surveys of three blocks containing 75,814 acres, showing subdivisions and overlapping claims, have been prepared in readiness for the investigations to be held by the Court. In many cases where there are conflicting and overlapping claims the owners are saved much expense for surveys if sketch plans are first prepared, leaving the final traverse surveys to be made after the Court has decided upon the different claims. Hoeace Bakeb, Chief Surveyor.

WELLINGTON. Undee the principal headings of the general return it will be observed that the out-turn of work consists of minor triangulation and topographical surveys, 346,716 acres; rural sectional surveys, 40,516 acres; Native Land Court and Native land purchase, 33,221 acres; roads, 108 miles; standard surveys of Wanganui and Marton. Triangulation. —The extension of triangulation last season was accomplished—(l) by Mr. J. A. Thorpe, in the country lying between Otairi and Murimotu, on both sides of the road from Marton to Taupo; (2) Mr. District-Surveyor Dundas covered the Northern Otamakapua Block between Barton's road-line and the Bangitikei Biver; (3) Mr. District-Surveyor Northcroft completed the triangulation and topographical survey of portions of the Crown lands in the Forty-Mile Bush country, west of the Puketoi Banges; and (4) Mr. District-Surveyor Climie's area comprises the mountains and hills between Port Nicholson and the Wairarapa Lakes. Considering that the triangulation was carried over mountainous and hilly forest country, generally difficult of access, the surveyors may be congratulated upon the low cost per acre. It will be observed that Mr. District-Surveyor J. D. Climie is entitled to most credit on account of the extent and cheapness of his work. The mean linear error derived from a comparison of all the closures made upon common sides amounts to 6f inches per mile. The mapping has been executed in a practical, complete, and finished manner. If the autumn weather ha-d not been so unfavourable, Mr. Climie would have increased the out-turn of work under this head by 80,000 acres; and Mr. District-Surveyor L. Smith would have furnished diagrams and topographical plans of 120,000 acres in the Mangahao District; Mr. Assistant-Surveyor Struthers also had 60,000 acres of the Awhea country all but triangulated. Settlement Surveys. —The lands surveyed under this head were either to define the remaining applications made in conformity wth the original Wellington Land Begulations, or of ordinary Crown lands for sale; and comprise the Himatangi Block, South and East Mauriceville, and Dreyer's Bock country, and areas in the Wangaehu, Wainuiomata, Awhea, Pohangina, and Pakowhai Districts. There are now no arrears of applications to be defined. The sectional surveys are yearly becoming more costly, owing to the greater care and time bestowed in running trial grades for roads in forest country of complicated features, and the extra cutting and pegging necessitated in surveys of detached areas contiguous to imperfectly demarcated prior work. Beturn No. 4 shows that the mean linear error does not exceed two and a quarter links per mile. Before proceeding to the consideration of the other classes of survey, I desire to remind you that some of the sectional areas, besides others now being surveyed, cannot be offered for sale until opened up by roads, and that, owing to the time required by the counties or Boad Boards to carry out such works, a considerable period of time must elapse before the blocks can be offered to the public, additions be made to revenue, or fresh areas of land be brought under cultivation. The blocks which require to be made accessible are the Paratieke, Karewarewa, and Heao, in the Wanganui District, the Otairi in Upper